The Plague, Pestilence & Apocalypse MEGAPACK™

by Robert Reed

  she worshipped . We all stood mute; many knelt . In a few minutes

  however, we were recalled to human wonder and sympathy by a

  familiar strain . The air was Haydn’s “New-Created World,” and, old

  and drooping as humanity had become, the world yet fresh as at

  creation’s day, might still be worthily celebrated by such an hymn of

  praise . Adrian and I entered the church; the nave was empty, though

  the smoke of incense rose from the altar, bringing with it the recol-

  lection of vast congregations, in once thronged cathedrals; we went

  into the loft . A blind old man sat at the bellows; his whole soul was

  ear; and as he sat in the attitude of attentive listening, a bright glow

  of pleasure was diffused over his countenance; for, though his lack-

  lustre eye could not reflect the beam, yet his parted lips, and every

  line of his face and venerable brow spoke delight . A young woman

  sat at the keys, perhaps twenty years of age . Her auburn hair hung on

  her neck, and her fair brow shone in its own beauty; but her droop-

  ing eyes let fall fast-flowing tears, while the constraint she exercised

  THE LAST MAN, by Mary Shelley | 1220

  to suppress her sobs, and still her trembling, flushed her else pale

  cheek; she was thin; languor, and alas! sickness, bent her form . We

  stood looking at the pair, forgetting what we heard in the absorb-

  ing sight; till, the last chord struck, the peal died away in lessening

  reverberations . The mighty voice, inorganic we might call it, for we

  could in no way associate it with mechanism of pipe or key, stilled

  its sonorous tone, and the girl, turning to lend her assistance to her

  aged companion, at length perceived us .

  It was her father; and she, since childhood, had been the guide of

  his darkened steps . They were Germans from Saxony, and, emigrat-

  ing thither but a few years before, had formed new ties with the

  surrounding villagers . About the time that the pestilence had broken

  out, a young German student had joined them . Their simple history

  was easily divined . He, a noble, loved the fair daughter of the poor

  musician, and followed them in their flight from the persecutions

  of his friends; but soon the mighty leveller came with unblunted

  scythe to mow, together with the grass, the tall flowers of the field.

  The youth was an early victim . She preserved herself for her father’s

  sake. His blindness permitted her to continue a delusion, at first the

  child of accident—and now solitary beings, sole survivors in the

  land, he remained unacquainted with the change, nor was aware that

  when he listened to his child’s music, the mute mountains, senseless

  lake, and unconscious trees, were, himself excepted, her sole audi-

  tors .The very day that we arrived she had been attacked by symp-

  tomatic illness . She was paralyzed with horror at the idea of leaving

  her aged, sightless father alone on the empty earth; but she had not

  courage to disclose the truth, and the very excess of her despera-

  tion animated her to surpassing exertions . At the accustomed vesper

  hour, she led him to the chapel; and, though trembling and weeping

  on his account, she played, without fault in time, or error in note, the

  hymn written to celebrate the creation of the adorned earth, soon to

  be her tomb .

  We came to her like visitors from heaven itself; her high-wrought

  courage; her hardly sustained firmness, fled with the appearance of

  THE LAST MAN, by Mary Shelley | 1221

  relief . With a shriek she rushed towards us, embraced the knees of

  Adrian, and uttering but the words, “O save my father!” with sobs

  and hysterical cries, opened the long-shut floodgates of her woe.

  Poor girl!—she and her father now lie side by side, beneath the

  high walnut-tree where her lover reposes, and which in her dying

  moments she had pointed out to us . Her father, at length aware of

  his daughter’s danger, unable to see the changes of her dear coun-

  tenance, obstinately held her hand, till it was chilled and stiffened

  by death . Nor did he then move or speak, till, twelve hours after,

  kindly death took him to his breakless repose . They rest beneath

  the sod, the tree their monument;—the hallowed spot is distinct in

  my memory, paled in by craggy Jura, and the far, immeasurable

  Alps; the spire of the church they frequented still points from out

  the embosoming trees; and though her hand be cold, still methinks

  the sounds of divine music which they loved wander about, solacing

  their gentle ghosts .

  CHAPTER VIII.

  We had now reached Switzerland, so long the final mark and aim

  of our exertions . We had looked, I know not wherefore, with hope

  and pleasing expectation on her congregation of hills and snowy

  crags, and opened our bosoms with renewed spirits to the icy Biz,

  which even at Midsummer used to come from the northern glacier

  laden with cold . Yet how could we nourish expectation of relief?

  Like our native England, and the vast extent of fertile France, this

  mountain-embowered land was desolate of its inhabitants . Nor

  bleak mountain-top, nor snow-nourished rivulet; not the ice-laden

  Biz, nor thunder, the tamer of contagion, had preserved them— why

  therefore should we claim exemption?

  Who was there indeed to save? What troop had we brought fit

  to stand at bay, and combat with the conqueror? We were a failing

  remnant, tamed to mere submission to the coming blow . A train half

  dead, through fear of death—a hopeless, unresisting, almost reck-

  less crew, which, in the tossed bark of life, had given up all pilotage,

  THE LAST MAN, by Mary Shelley | 1222

  and resigned themselves to the destructive force of ungoverned

  winds . Like a few furrows of unreaped corn, which, left standing on

  a wide field after the rest is gathered to the garner, are swiftly borne

  down by the winter storm . Like a few straggling swallows, which,

  remaining after their fellows had, on the first unkind breath of pass-

  ing autumn, migrated to genial climes, were struck to earth by the

  first frost of November. Like a stray sheep that wanders over the

  sleet-beaten hill-side, while the flock is in the pen, and dies before

  morning-dawn . Like a cloud, like one of many that were spread in

  impenetrable woof over the sky, which, when the shepherd north

  has driven its companions “to drink Antipodean noon,” fades and

  dissolves in the clear ether—Such were we!

  We left the fair margin of the beauteous lake of Geneva, and en-

  tered the Alpine ravines; tracing to its source the brawling Arve,

  through the rock-bound valley of Servox, beside the mighty wa-

  terfalls, and under the shadow of the inaccessible mountains, we

  travelled on; while the luxuriant walnut-tree gave place to the dark

  pine, whose musical branches swung in the wind, and whose upright

  forms had braved a thousand storms—till the verdant sod, the flow-

  ery dell, and shrubbery hill were exchanged for the sky-piercing,

  untrodden, seedless rock, “the bones of the world, waiting to be

  clothed with every thing neces
sary to give life and beauty .”25 Strange

  that we should seek shelter here! Surely, if, in those countries where

  earth was wont, like a tender mother, to nourish her children, we

  had found her a destroyer, we need not seek it here, where stricken

  by keen penury she seems to shudder through her stony veins . Nor

  were we mistaken in our conjecture . We vainly sought the vast and

  ever moving glaciers of Chamounix, rifts of pendant ice, seas of

  congelated waters, the leafless groves of tempest-battered pines,

  dells, mere paths for the loud avalanche, and hill-tops, the resort

  of thunder-storms . Pestilence reigned paramount even here . By the

  time that day and night, like twin sisters of equal growth, shared

  equally their dominion over the hours, one by one, beneath the

  ice-caves, beside the waters springing from the thawed snows of a

  25

  Mary Wollstonecraft’s Letters from Norway .

  THE LAST MAN, by Mary Shelley | 1223

  thousand winters, another and yet another of the remnant of the race

  of Man, closed their eyes for ever to the light .

  Yet we were not quite wrong in seeking a scene like this, whereon

  to close the drama . Nature, true to the last, consoled us in the very

  heart of misery . Sublime grandeur of outward objects soothed our

  hapless hearts, and were in harmony with our desolation . Many sor-

  rows have befallen man during his chequered course; and many a

  woe-stricken mourner has found himself sole survivor among many .

  Our misery took its majestic shape and colouring from the vast ruin,

  that accompanied and made one with it . Thus on lovely earth, many

  a dark ravine contains a brawling stream, shadowed by romantic

  rocks, threaded by mossy paths—but all, except this, wanted the

  mighty back-ground, the towering Alps, whose snowy capes, or

  bared ridges, lifted us from our dull mortal abode, to the palaces of

  Nature’s own .

  This solemn harmony of event and situation regulated our feel-

  ings, and gave as it were fitting costume to our last act. Majestic

  gloom and tragic pomp attended the decease of wretched humanity .

  The funeral procession of monarchs of old, was transcended by our

  splendid shews . Near the sources of the Arveiron we performed the

  rites for, four only excepted, the last of the species . Adrian and I,

  leaving Clara and Evelyn wrapt in peaceful unobserving slumber,

  carried the body to this desolate spot, and placed it in those caves

  of ice beneath the glacier, which rive and split with the slightest

  sound, and bring destruction on those within the clefts—no bird or

  beast of prey could here profane the frozen form . So, with hushed

  steps and in silence, we placed the dead on a bier of ice, and then,

  departing, stood on the rocky platform beside the river springs . All

  hushed as we had been, the very striking of the air with our per-

  sons had sufficed to disturb the repose of this thawless region; and

  we had hardly left the cavern, before vast blocks of ice, detaching

  themselves from the roof, fell, and covered the human image we

  had deposited within . We had chosen a fair moonlight night, but

  our journey thither had been long, and the crescent sank behind the

  western heights by the time we had accomplished our purpose . The

  THE LAST MAN, by Mary Shelley | 1224

  snowy mountains and blue glaciers shone in their own light . The

  rugged and abrupt ravine, which formed one side of Mont Anvert,

  was opposite to us, the glacier at our side; at our feet Arveiron, white

  and foaming, dashed over the pointed rocks that jutted into it, and,

  with whirring spray and ceaseless roar, disturbed the stilly night .

  Yellow lightnings played around the vast dome of Mont Blanc, si-

  lent as the snow-clad rock they illuminated; all was bare, wild, and

  sublime, while the singing of the pines in melodious murmurings

  added a gentle interest to the rough magnificence. Now the riving

  and fall of icy rocks clave the air; now the thunder of the avalanche

  burst on our ears . In countries whose features are of less magnitude,

  nature betrays her living powers in the foliage of the trees, in the

  growth of herbage, in the soft purling of meandering streams; here,

  endowed with giant attributes, the torrent, the thunder-storm, and

  the flow of massive waters, display her activity. Such the church-

  yard, such the requiem, such the eternal congregation, that waited

  on our companion’s funeral!

  Nor was it the human form alone which we had placed in this

  eternal sepulchre, whose obsequies we now celebrated . With this

  last victim Plague vanished from the earth . Death had never wanted

  weapons wherewith to destroy life, and we, few and weak as we had

  become, were still exposed to every other shaft with which his full

  quiver teemed . But pestilence was absent from among them . For

  seven years it had had full sway upon earth; she had trod every nook

  of our spacious globe; she had mingled with the atmosphere, which

  as a cloak enwraps all our fellow-creatures—the inhabitants of na-

  tive Europe—the luxurious Asiatic—the swarthy African and free

  American had been vanquished and destroyed by her . Her barbarous

  tyranny came to its close here in the rocky vale of Chamounix .

  Still recurring scenes of misery and pain, the fruits of this distem-

  per, made no more a part of our lives—the word plague no longer

  rung in our ears—the aspect of plague incarnate in the human coun-

  tenance no longer appeared before our eyes . From this moment I

  saw plague no more . She abdicated her throne, and despoiled herself

  THE LAST MAN, by Mary Shelley | 1225

  of her imperial sceptre among the ice rocks that surrounded us . She

  left solitude and silence co-heirs of her kingdom .

  My present feelings are so mingled with the past, that I cannot

  say whether the knowledge of this change visited us, as we stood on

  this sterile spot . It seems to me that it did; that a cloud seemed to

  pass from over us, that a weight was taken from the air; that hence-

  forth we breathed more freely, and raised our heads with some por-

  tion of former liberty . Yet we did not hope . We were impressed by

  the sentiment, that our race was run, but that plague would not be

  our destroyer . The coming time was as a mighty river, down which

  a charmed boat is driven, whose mortal steersman knows, that the

  obvious peril is not the one he needs fear, yet that danger is nigh;

  and who floats awe-struck under beetling precipices, through the

  dark and turbid waters—seeing in the distance yet stranger and

  ruder shapes, towards which he is irresistibly impelled . What would

  become of us? O for some Delphic oracle, or Pythian maid, to utter

  the secrets of futurity! O for some Oedipus to solve the riddle of

  the cruel Sphynx! Such Oedipus was I to be—not divining a word’s

  juggle, but whose agonizing pangs, and sorrow-tainted life were to

  be the engines, wherewith to lay bare the secrets of destiny, and

  reveal the meaning of the enigma, whose explanation closed the his-

  tory of the human race .
/>
  Dim fancies, akin to these, haunted our minds, and instilled feel-

  ings not unallied to pleasure, as we stood beside this silent tomb of

  nature, reared by these lifeless mountains, above her living veins,

  choking her vital principle . “Thus are we left,” said Adrian, “two

  melancholy blasted trees, where once a forest waved . We are left to

  mourn, and pine, and die . Yet even now we have our duties, which

  we must string ourselves to fulfil: the duty of bestowing pleasure

  where we can, and by force of love, irradiating with rainbow hues

  the tempest of grief . Nor will I repine if in this extremity we preserve

  what we now possess . Something tells me, Verney, that we need no

  longer dread our cruel enemy, and I cling with delight to the oracular

  voice . Though strange, it will be sweet to mark the growth of your

  little boy, and the development of Clara’s young heart . In the midst

  THE LAST MAN, by Mary Shelley | 1226

  of a desert world, we are everything to them; and, if we live, it must

  be our task to make this new mode of life happy to them . At pres-

  ent this is easy, for their childish ideas do not wander into futurity,

  and the stinging craving for sympathy, and all of love of which our

  nature is susceptible, is not yet awake within them: we cannot guess

  what will happen then, when nature asserts her indefeasible and sa-

  cred powers; but, long before that time, we may all be cold, as he

  who lies in yonder tomb of ice . We need only provide for the pres-

  ent, and endeavour to fill with pleasant images the inexperienced

  fancy of your lovely niece . The scenes which now surround us, vast

  and sublime as they are, are not such as can best contribute to this

  work . Nature is here like our fortunes, grand, but too destructive,

  bare, and rude, to be able to afford delight to her young imagination .

  Let us descend to the sunny plains of Italy . Winter will soon be here,

  to clothe this wilderness in double desolation; but we will cross the

  bleak hill-tops, and lead her to scenes of fertility and beauty, where

  her path will be adorned with flowers, and the cheery atmosphere

  inspire pleasure and hope .”

  In pursuance of this plan we quitted Chamounix on the following

  day . We had no cause to hasten our steps; no event was transacted

  beyond our actual sphere to enchain our resolves, so we yielded to